Illusions
by Moullei
Summary: Yukiatsu saw something in her one day. A shift, some sort of phenomenon that drove him into a silent insanity. In his attempts to see, he surprisingly found something entirely different; something more than his sick fantasies.


**Disclaimer: I do not own AnoHana**

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She was always good at knowing whose footsteps were near her; whose body paused and kneeled on any floor- this case school linoleum-; whose shoes belonged to whichever soul seemed to antagonize her with their blind circumference. It may have been her only talent at the time. It was so normal.

There was an exasperated sigh and a grunt, the tips of his hair peeking right beneath the door of the bathroom stall to make sure those same slim and tucked in legs were there. Anaru gave an acknowledging sniff. He found her.

Hide-and-seek was all that it manifested itself at the time. She was a terrible player, and he was impatient. Like always.

"You could get suspended for peeping in a girl's bathroom." Her fingers curled around her new sweater as she looked at nothing except for the scribbles of teenage drama on the wall.

"And here I am." He relaxed on the balls of his feet and waited.

"Go away."

"Ok."

She could hear the watch Tsurumi bought him _tick tick tick. _It seemed to synchronize with the tears slipping off her chin. She heard it was such an expensive watch. Sleek, desired, functional. Just like him, save for the latter. Definitely _not _the latter.

_Tick tick tick. _

It was by accident he saw her racing down the hall with a reddened face and teary eyes. She couldn't hold her emotions in long enough to reach the bathroom when she let out a sob as she ran by. Unbeknownst to her was that tall, slim figure of his who didn't even have to look to know it was her. All he needed was that flash of unnatural hair on his way back from the library. He stopped as soon as her footsteps faded, turned his back to his previous path, and slowly in a trance-like manner headed for the girl's bathroom.

"I said go away." Her heart beat shamefully quick knowing his presence remained unyielding.

Too many times did he relentlessly toil after her for reasons she could not fathom. He was cold-hearted; a lonely and hollow intelligence attempting to parade around those with emotion; a condescending mock-jester and his 'majesty'.

That is what it felt like. She never knew, but now she hated it. It never should have started, it never should have been like this. It was dysfunctional.

_It _was _him. _

_Everyone. _

Once she tried bleaching her hair, troubling herself over a pair of blue contacts. Then she walked around town, waiting for someone to recognize her.

"We can talk about it."

Little did she know, Yukiatsu ran the same route circumnavigating the area she shoved herself in to. It wasn't like he stalked her the way home, he just needed a change of scenery. The slow process gave him time to practice his English and multitask. His feet were light enough and his breathing able to soundlessly aid him.

They entered her neighborhood, a place he scarcely remembered, maybe never stepped foot in. The trees aligned themselves differently, he noticed they were taller and the houses, smaller. It was an older area of town. The lamp posts prematurely lit and cast a strange shadow on the both of them. Yukiatsu noticed in frustration how defenseless her insecure thoughts made her. They dulled her senses and kept her blind to him. He reasoned it was out of devout chivalry that he follow the girl.

Her defeated figure remorsefully swung with the wind ahead. A ghost traveled against the wishful thinking in his mind long enough to drown the foreign words slipping in his ear, the only name making cool resonance in his heart played with his eyes. The girl yards in front of him seemed to transform; shortening in height, hair growing longer, figure becoming more child-like. It was such a magnificent illusion. An infrequent and maddening allusion. A subconsciously conspired rapture in his mind. The little girl in everyone's dreams would never go away, and yet would never again show herself in the natural occurring world. The suppressed emotions broke the barrier that seemed to separate his ill-fantasies from his conscious. They collided forcefully, but as soon as his blood began to run with him, Anaru changed back and was stepping inside her house.

That night she colored her hair back to the way it was supposed to be.

"We both know you don't care." The bathroom door swung open and Anaru looked down where he perched. He observed how hard she attempted at hiding her frown. She replaced it with a scowl and quickly moved over to the sink. Yukiatsu sighed and rocked himself back up.

Her fingers made quick work of the mascara- now everywhere else except her eyelashes- and tried not to focus on the foreign figure in the mirror. She wondered why no girls had come in at this point, screaming with a mixture of fear and delight that Yukiatsu stood like a perverse dog in the bathroom.

"Sure I do. I'm going to walk you home after school." What a confident idea, not even bothering to ask her if its alright.

Her heart pounded with a false identity as the bell suddenly rang, once, twice- she gripped on the last one; voices and footsteps reached the bathroom, Yukiatsu looked at her meaningfully. "I'll meet you at your locker." And before anyone managed to come in much to Anaru's hopes, the boy disappeared with his shadow.

Maybe there was some way she could avoid her locker, she began to contemplate. She knew he always walked home with Tsurumi. It was never fair. Did he even bother to tell her? Anaru gripped the sides of her sink and looked down at the drain. She was going to drown.

Yukiatsu quickly texted his black-haired, dangerously quiet classmate. _I have other plans_. Flipping his phone shut, he closed his eyes and tried to remember what logical occurrence led him to see Menma and her curious, innocent figure.

Then there was Jintan. It was impossible to think of one without the other.

He was back in school. It seemed he put an extra effort into learning- A kind effort for the soul he used to live beside- and focused on nothing else. And yes, he watched with a slighted ego as Anaru, with a rare motivation for the past, reached her old crush while walking to school. She looked at him, and he dug his eyes further in his book of dreams. Everyone still separated themselves mentally, even though not always physically.

Yukiatsu preferred it that way.

Anaru ended up showing, her problems tucked away hopelessly. And like a good gentleman, he guided her away from the evil that lurked on the way home. He boasted to himself how much of a sympathetic he was.

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I haven't published anything in such a long time, and this is what I make. Anyways, thanks for reading!


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